Name changes can be difficult sometimes, even for the people directing them.
Last week, Jeanette Mott Oxford had to re-send a news release - because the first one she sent identified herself as the "executive director of Missouri Association for Social Welfare."
But the group this year changed its name to "Empower Missouri," which the rest of the release included.
Mott Oxford became the organization's director in 2013, after serving eight years in the Missouri House and losing a three-way primary in August 2012 for the state Senate seat now held by Jamilah Nasheed, D-St. Louis.
"The board did a strategic planning process (in 2010) before I got here," she said, "and one of the discussion points was, "We should think about whether we should change our name.'"
Founded in 1901 as the "Missouri Conference on Corrections and Charities," the group adopted the MASW name in 1933.
But, Mott Oxford said, "People confused us for other things. They think we're the (state) Department of Social Services, and that people come here to apply for welfare. ...
"People also saw the initials MASW, and there's a group called the National Association of Social Workers, so they assumed we were the Missouri affiliate."
A lot of the group's members are social workers, she said, "But we also have chemical engineers, line cooks at a casino (and) a wide variety of members who care about a broad umbrella of social condition and basic human needs kinds of issues."
And the word "welfare" carries negative connotations that "can get doors shut in your face these days - and that's very sad because there's nothing wrong with the word "welfare,'" Mott Oxford said. "It's right there in the U.S. Constitution. It's in the Bible, as well."
It's even part of Missouri's motto: "Let the Welfare of the People Be the Supreme Law."
"I think that's one of the reasons that our group continued using that word, back in 1933," she said.
The new name - Empower Missouri - has found general support among the organization's members and supporters.
It was chosen after an online poll of members.
"There was very little resistance to the idea of changing the name," she said. "For the most part, there seems to be a lot of excitement about it and a lot of energy about it.
"And the response from people who aren't members has been uniformly positive, so far."
When people face a big social ill, like poverty, she said, "You can feel overwhelmed and depressed."
Empower Missouri is intended to help "people know that something can be done about it, that there are solutions. And - by speaking out together - we can change things in ways that will improve the quality of life for those who are disadvantaged.
"And when we do that, it improves everybody's quality of life - we all do better if we all do better."
Mott Oxford said the "ripples of poverty wind up hurting the quality of life for more affluent people as well," because it can affect housing stock, crime or health issues where "people who are sick can spread disease."
The organization works to convince people "to take action" to fix social problems, she said, "whether that's through charitable acts, through acts in solidarity with others" - like being a mentor, working with Big Brothers/Big Sisters, coaching a youth sports team - or "changing policies when there are things that hold people back. We have set up so many structural barriers to getting out of poverty."
The group also lobbies the Legislature, seeking to get laws that are helpful - and not punitive - to people in poverty situations.
Empower Missouri calls itself a "citizen advocacy organization working to improve the quality of life for all Missourians - and we especially want to address poverty and hunger," she noted.
Mott Oxford, 60, grew up in Hardin County, in far southeastern Illinois, next to the Ohio River and Kentucky.
"There was no town with more than 500 people in the county," she recalled.
After high school and college, she attended the United Church of Christ's Eden Theological Seminary in Webster Groves - earning a master's degree in divinity.
In 1991, she became director of ROWEL, the Reform Organization of Welfare, which "focused more exclusively on issues like Aid for Families With Dependent Children, now called TANF - Temporary Assistance for Needy Families," Mott Oxford said, "and food stamps and Medicaid, issues of the poorest of the poor."
In that job two decades ago, she worked with MASW and its then-director, Peter DeSimone, frequently on common issues - including health care and creation of the Missouri Foundation for Health when the not-for-profit Blue Cross/Blue Shield of St. Louis became Anthem, a for-profit company.
She considers him a mentor and said last week, "I had this funny feeling that ... I had some kind of future with this group."
After serving in the Missouri House from 2003-13, representing an area of south St. Louis, and then losing that Senate primary, Mott Oxford saw an ad that MASW was looking for a new director - and applied.
"If people remember only one thing about us," Mott Oxford said, "we don't have to feel hopeless about large social problems about poverty and hunger - things can change.
"And it's essential that they do."
Empower Missouri recently sold its headquarters building, 606 E. Capitol Ave., to a man in California (state) "who grew up here," Mott Oxford said, adding he wants to "restore it to residential (and) bring it back to its former glory, hopefully."
They'll be relocating to offices at 308 E. High St. - a building they've rented from before.